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For the first time since America’s Cup racing began in San Francisco in early July, there were two lead changes after the opening jibes in one race, along with several near-collisions.

Genuine competition and excitement arrived together at the regatta Saturday when the long-awaited finals between challenger Emirates Team New Zealand and Oracle Team USA began. Slicing out much of the thrill for Oracle, the Kiwis swept both races.

Their superior crew work showed on tacks – the upwind turns – and they even had an edge in sheer boat speed. If Oracle doesn’t get its act together, its chances could slide out the Golden Gate.

“That was a fantastic day. We’re really happy with how it all panned out,” New Zealand tactician Ray Davies said, moments after the racing ended.

Because of a two-race penalty imposed on Oracle for illegal weight placements over the last two years, the Kiwis lead 2-to-minus-2. They need seven more wins to capture the Cup, while Oracle needs 11 to retain it.

In a first race enlivened by five near-collisions, New Zealand took control on the upwind third leg (out of five) and won by 36 seconds. For many onlookers, the tight race was a sweet nectar after the competitive drought of the regatta’s first seven weeks.

The first few minutes of a Cup race are like the last two minutes of an NBA playoff game; they generally determine who wins.

After beating Oracle skipper Jimmy Spithill to the starting line in both races, Kiwis skipper Dean Barker guided his team to leads at the first mark. Similar prestart duels are expected in Sunday’s two races and the rest of the finals.

“The starting will be fierce,” Kiwis wing trimmer Glenn Ashby said. “That’s what these two guys do best. Sometimes the rest of us as crews and tacticians have just got to hang on.

“That’s what makes racing exciting. It’s two guys at the top of their game, and they’re at the wheel of a $10 million carbon-fiber missile.”

Despite the disappointment, Spithill showed his customary enthusiasm for the 72-foot catamarans. “We think this is the way forward,” he said. “It’s exciting for the sailors, and the designers and engineers love it. … It just feels like we’re up there with the other sports now.”

A thrilling upwind third leg spiced the first race. On one cross, Oracle’s port bow missed the Kiwis’ starboard stern by less than a foot. With Bay Area native John Kostecki guiding the tactics, Oracle passed the Kiwis midway through the leg.

Davies, the New Zealand tactician, found an edge in the lighter flood tide closer to shore, allowing his team to zip back in front two-thirds of the way through the leg. It had no trouble the rest of the way.

Just before the second race, Oracle had to patch a tear in its wing, a wound that had no bearing on the outcome, according to Spithill. What did have a bearing was Barker’s cutting in front of his boat on its way to the starting line.

This time, the Kiwis didn’t give up the lead and carved out a 52-second victory. They “didn’t make any mistakes,” Spithill said. “It was all over pretty quickly.”

Although New Zealand was just over two knots faster in each race, Spithill said he didn’t think his team lost on boat speed.

“We made a few little mistakes here and there,” he said. “There will be a lot of lessons learned.”

Ousted crewman wants rehearing: Dirk de Ridder’s attorney has demanded that the jury that threw the Dutch wing trimmer out of the Cup competition reinstate him to the Oracle crew.

In a letter to the jury, attorney Terry Anderlini said the jury acted unfairly because it also served as investigators and prosecutors. He accused the jury of, among other things, sacking de Ridder illegally and releasing confidential hearing transcripts not only to Cup officials but to Team New Zealand.

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Tom FitzGerald is the Stanford sports beat writer for The Chronicle. In more than three decades at The Chronicle, he has covered the 49ers and Raiders and a wide variety of other sports, including auto races. Among the many momentous games he has covered were the 49ers' victory over Dallas in the 1982 NFC Championship Game, which featured "The Catch'' by Dwight Clark, and the U.S. hockey team’s 1980 Olympic upset of the Soviet Union in Lake Placid, N.Y. At the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, he rode the bobsled run with members of the U.S. team for a first-person story. In 2012 he rode on Russell Coutts’ Oracle Team USA catamaran for another first-person story during the America's Cup World Series. In 2014 he rode with IndyCar legend Mario Andretti in a racecar at Sonoma Raceway, hitting speeds of more than 150 mph.
For 15 years he wrote a popular sports humor column called “Top of the Sixth’’ (later named Open Season). He lives in Martinez.